Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1887-08-26
SCIENTIFIC AND INDUSTRIAL.

Good carpets from common moss are
the recent production of q French manu-
featuring establishment.
The cause of grouse disease, which
has proven so destructive to British
game, is to be investigated by Pasteur.
By the use of palladium in tie hair
spring and balance, a Geneva watch
maker claims to have produced accurate
time-pieces which are unaffected by
magnetism.
A new sword handle has been con-
structed by Leipsic professor on, it is
claimed, anatomical principles. The de-
signcr asserts that, being planned with
reference to the hands mechanism, it can
be held with absolute safety.
Cotton has been successfully intro
duced into the districts of the Caucasus,
and extensive plantations are to be estab
lished in the vicinity of Erivan. The
Caucasus Agricultural Sociery will send
agents to study the American system of
culture.
Pasteur proves the value c1 his pre-.
ventive of splenic fever by showing that
in France, during the last five years, the
mortality of inoculated sheep has ranged
from 0.75 to 1.08 per cent, that of non
inoculated being 10 per cent. Only 0.2S
to $50 per cent. of inoculated cattle died
and per cent. of others.
So various are the forms of plant-life
that it seems well-nigh iIs -.Ssible to find
spot where some kind of vegetation will
not thrive. Mr.. John Ball, naturalist
returned from South America, therefore
congratulates himself on having seen an
absolutely plantess land at Tocopill, about
twenty two degrees south of the equator,
on the rainless west coast. Not so much
as lichen could be discovered on the
rocks, even with microscopic aid.
A popular fallacy, according to Mr.. A.
W. Hare, of the Royal Society of Edin-
burgh, is the belief that water from q
rushing torrent is safer for drinking pur-
poses than water from a sluggish stream,
for the reverse is really the fact. Sewage
contaminated water contains fewer or
ganisms after ten or twelve days than
river water for the reason that the
microbes rapid growth during the first
two or three days eXhausts their food
supply.
An immense drainage work undertaken
by the Russian Government contemplates
the recovery of the vast region known as
the Pinsk marshes, in the southwest of
Russia, near the borders of Gallicia and
which hitherto has prevented communi-
cation, not only between the Russian
districts on either side, but also between
Russia and Austro- Germany. Up to the
present time about a, 900, 900 acres have
been reclaimed by means of the construc-
tion of several thousand miles of bitches
and canals.
Recent discoveries have settled the
vexed question of the former existence of
lions in Australia Bones from the We'll
lington Caves, New South Wales, are re-
garded by Professor Owen, of the British
Museum, as being those of marsupial
or pouch-bearing lion, fully equal in size
to the existing African species. These
remains were found in connection with
those of the Tasmanian Tiger and Tas-
manian Devil Quite curiously, Profes-
sor Owen many years ago expressed the
conviction that certain ancient herbivor-
Gus animals of Australia must have been
kept in check by co-existent race of
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